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StoryCorps 447: Forget Me Not

In this podcast we’re highlighting stories form our Memory Loss Initiative. These interviews help people with Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of memory loss get their stories on tape. It also lets family members and caretakers reflect on the impact the diagnosis has had on them.

We begin with the very first Memory Loss story we ever produced. In 2006, Priya Morganstern (above left) and Bhavani Jaroff brought their father, Ken Morganstern, to our recording booth in Grand Central Terminal. He was living with Alzheimer’s and the sisters wanted to record his memories while they still could. After Ken passed away in 2007, his daughters returned to StoryCorps to remember him.

From a story about a dad to one about a mom, Teresa Valko’s family has been battling Alzheimer’s disease for generations. She lives in California and her mother, Evelyn Wilson, lives in Georgia. Almost a decade ago, Evelyn began to show symptoms of memory loss, and Teresa remembers how their regular telephone conversations began to change.

Husband and wife Jo Ann and Bob Chew married later in life, a second marriage for both of them. Jo Ann, who is older than Bob, worried that one day he would have to take care of her. When they recorded this interview, Jo Ann was just beginning to show signs of early stage Alzheimer’s.

Like the music in this episode? Support the artists:
“Twelve Diseases” by Welcome Wizard from the album Lunachild“A Spire” by Tape from the album Rideau“Milo” by Fredrik from the album Trilogi
“Dunes” by Podington Bear from the album Solo Instruments
“Comptine d’un autre été – L’après-midi” by Yann Tiersen from the album Amélie from Montmartre (Bande originale du film)

Photo of Priya Morganstern, Ken Morganstern, and Bhavani Jaroff.

Transcript

StoryCorps 447: Forget Me Not RERUN

Michael Garofalo (MG): From NPR, this is the StoryCorps podcast. I’m Michael Garofalo.

[MUSIC IN]

MG: You’ve heard me and other producers talk about StoryCorps Initiatives. We’ve shared stories from our OutLoud Initiative, which records LGBTQ folks and also, our Military Voices Initiative. Those are just two of many special efforts that we’ve done over the past decade. ”Griot,” for example, is a project dedicated to conversations between African Americans. ”Historias” collects stories of Latinos. And we have a 9/11 Initiative for families and survivors of that event.

In this episode, though, we’re going to hear stories from our Memory Loss Initiative. These interviews let people with Alzheimer’s Disease and other forms of memory loss get their stories on tape. And it also lets caretakers and family members talk about what impact the diseases had on them. We’ve collected more than 1,800 of these interviews. We’re going to start things off with a conversation that was the very first memory loss story we ever produced. It was recorded in 2006 when two daughters brought their father, who is in his 80s and living with Alzheimer’s, to our recording booth in Grand Central Terminal. They wanted to record his memories while they still could.

[MUSIC OUT]

Priya Morganstern (PM): I’m Priya Morgenstern.

Ken Morganstern (KM): Excuse me. Can you raise the volume?

PM: I can raise my volume.

KM: Yes, louder. Yeah.

PM: Okay, let me turn the dial. I’m going to be interviewing my father today, and I’ll be interviewing him with my sister, Bhavani.

PM: Dad, why don’t you say your name and how old you are?

KM: I’m Ken Morgenstern. I’m – I think 81.

PM: That’s right.

KM: Is that right?

PM: Yes.

KM: Okay.

Bhavani Jaroff (BJ): All right, dad, I’m going to ask you a bunch of questions.

KM: All right.

BJ: And you’ll answer them the best you can from your memory. You came out here to New York and then somehow you met mom.

KM: I’m met her in New York?

BJ: Yup. You did.

KM: Don’t remember how, when. Mom would have remembered.

BJ: She would have remembered, yeah.

PM: Our mom passed away about four and a half years ago. Do you recall dating her?

KM: Oh yeah. I remember dating her. She was a sexy gal.

BJ: She was. Let’s talk about your kids a little bit.

KM: We had four kids. Is that the right number?

PM: Yes, it is.

KM: Good. They were great.

BJ: Who are they?

KM: You, who else?

BJ: Priya, Bhavani–

BJ: Priya, Bhavani, and there’s a man in there (laughs).

BJ: David, Dad.

KM: David, yeah.

BJ: David is not going to be too happy with you when he listens to this, Dad? (laughs)

BJ: Who was the best kid?

KM: David.

BJ: He was actually the best kid. No, he definitely was.

KM: He was.

PM: And you see us all a lot still, right, Dad? Dad?

KM: What?

BJ: Priya was asking if you still see us a lot?

KM: See you a lot?

BJ: Yeah. Are we in your life?

KM: Sure. What are you talking about?

BJ: We’re just asking you a question. You know, what’s your life like now, Dad?

KM: Oh, it’s a wonderful life. I get up in the morning. Go to sleep at night. And in between – three meals (laughs).

KM: What’s wrong with that?

PM: It’s a nice thing that is so easy to make you happy, Dad.

KM: I’m very much like I think my father.

PM: Mm-hmm.

KM: He was an easy-going guy. People used to call him Happy Harry. And I had a lot of his characteristics, I think.

PM: Dad, was there anything that you wish you had gotten in life that you didn’t get?

KM: Anything that I wish I have gotten in life?

PM: Yeah.

KM: I’m sitting here thinking I have no regrets on anything. The important thing is I have a family that I love. And they’re loving people. That’s the biggest thing that you leave as a–

BJ: –Legacy.

KM: Legacy, yeah.

BJ: I want to tell you, Dad, that I’ve always considered you my guru and teacher.

[MUSIC IN]

KM: Well, thank you.

PM: I would say the same.

BJ: You’ve been a role model for all of your family. People are constantly saying to us how lucky you are to have all of us, and I turn to them and say we are because of him. You’ve created such love around you and we want to be with you.

KM: Thank you, honey. That’s awfully nice to hear.

BJ: It’s the truth.

PM: I love you, Dad.

MG: That’s Ken Morganstern being interviewed by his daughters, Priya and Bhavani. Ken died just about a year after recording this interview. So we asked his daughters to come back in and tell us more about him.

[MUSIC OUT]

PM: It was very easy to be patient with him, because he was delightful. I mean, he was blind, but he would always say: It’s a beautiful day outside. And, of course, he couldn’t really see. It could be raining or gray, but it was, like, yeah, beautiful day.

BJ: I remember one time, we stopped for a bagel, and he’s taking a bite, and he goes: Who would have ever thought eating blind could be so much fun?

Laughter

BJ: Every bite’s a surprise. That’s how my father was.

PM: He was so present for us when we were kids, that I actually grew up thinking that he didn’t work during the summer, because I thought he was always there.

BJ: I remember him putting us to sleep. And he would just give us little, tiny kisses all over our face and on our eyelids and–

PM: Oh, yes, little baby kisses–

BJ: –you’d just go off to sleep. It was the best.

PM: The night that he passed, we were all there, telling funny stories and singing. And we played the clip at his funeral. And it was just like he was there.

BJ: Yeah. I listen to that clip often. I think my father had the opportunity to say what was important in his life, and it really came down to love.

PM: We were very lucky, really, really lucky.

[MUSIC IN]

MG: That’s Priya Morganstern and Bhavani Jaroff in New York City.

From a story about a dad to one about a mom, Teresa Valko’s family has been fighting Alzheimer’s Disease for generations. She lives in California and her mother, Evelyn Wilson, lives on the other side of the country, in Georgia. But they’ve always stayed in touch with frequent and pretty long phone conversations. Almost a decade ago, Theresa’s mom began to show symptoms of memory loss. That’s when their conversations began to change.

[MUSIC OUT]

Teresa Valko (TV): I would call and ask, ”Where did you go for dinner last night?” And, not only could she not answer, she would also get embarrassed, which made me feel horrible. But one of the questions I could ask her was, ”What’s blooming in your yard now?” because she had all these beautiful plants and trees. And so I could hear her on her phone going from window to window of her house and telling me about this beautiful pink azalea and her white camellia, and she would cheer up because she loved her flowers and she loved her yard. And then she progressed further and recalling the names was getting to be very difficult. So I asked her, could she tell me the colors that she sees? And that worked for a while, and she would tell me, ”Well, there’s a red and pink and yellow.” And then eventually we got to the point that she couldn’t even tell me colors. And our conversations became a monologue on my part. So I’ve essentially lost my mother, although she’s still living.

On my mother’s side of the family, there’s 100% occurrence of Alzheimer’s Disease. My grandmother was diagnosed, and all of her siblings were also all diagnosed. So I watched my mother live in absolute frozen, mortal fear of developing Alzheimer’s Disease.

I have done genetic testing, and I have the same genetic profile as my mother. It’s not often that someone is so aware of how they’re probably gonna die. I’m 47 now–I don’t know when I’ll be diagnosed, but I’m not gonna dwell on what’s coming. I don’t want to spend my time and my energy mourning something that hasn’t come to pass yet.

[MUSIC IN]

MG: That’s Teresa Valko in Thousand Oaks, California.

Let’s wrap up this episode with a final interview from our memory loss collection. This one is between a married couple. Jo Ann and Bob Chew married later in life. For both of them, it was a second marriage. When they recorded this interview, Bob was 70 years old. Jo Ann was 82 and just starting to show signs of early stage Alzheimer’s. At StoryCorps, we looked back on Jo Ann’s life and the time that they’ve spent together.

[MUSIC OUT]

Jo Ann Chew (JC): “My father said, If he sent me to college, that I could choose one of two things. He said you can choose home ec because I know you’ll be somebody’s wife, you’re too cute not to be somebody’s wife (laughs). Or number two, I could take up a secretarial course, ’cause you know, at that time there weren’t a lot of things that women did. So I decided the home ec was the way to go. I wanted to be somebody’s wife.

Bob Chew (BC): Are you still cooking today?

JC: Not today. I have been up to this point, but I have Alzheimer’s, the beginning of it, and uh, so I hear, and my doctor told me he did not want me to cook. And that was music to my ears (Laughs).

BC: Oh, who is doing all of the cooking?

JC: This fella across from me here. He’s turned out to be quite a professional, too.

BC: So how did we meet?

JC: Somehow we got together and I don’t even remember how it was. I’m trying to think. I bet you remember (Laughs).

BC: Yeah, I remember. I’m shocked that you don’t remember.

JC: Oh, I do. I just, aw–

BC: Remember the Christmas parties?

JC: Oh, yeah. And that’s when we really got to know one another, wasn’t it. My heart began to beat a little faster after quite a few months and I think yours did too. Then we decided we wanted to spend the rest of our lives together and we got married.

BC: Had you thought about remarrying?

JC: No, no no no no no.

BC: Why not?

JC: I just thought I was too old.

BC: Well, how old were you?

JC: I got to think. (Laughs.) How old was I? How old was I when we got married?

BC:(Whispering) Seventy.

JC: Seventy. And I kept trying to dissuade you from marrying me because I was older than you were. And I knew that there would come a time when I would be a little old lady and you would still have all the marks of a ten-year younger man. So here we are, still together, and I’m still 10 years older.

BC: Does that bother you today?

JC: No. It bothers me that I’m as I am. ’Cause I don’t want to be a burden.

BC: You think you’re a burden?

JC: Not really, ’cause you need someone to take care of, don’t you.

BC: That’s what I tell you.

JC: (Sniffs.) I know.

BC: The diagnosis–

JC: –Is not pretty. No.

BC: Do you feel sorry for yourself today?

JC: Little bit. Little bit. Big bit.

BC: A big bit?

JC: I’m sad.

BC: What’s — what are the things that are making you sad?

JC: Just not having control of everything. My thoughts, and my actions. And I don’t think it’s fair to you, either.

BC: You know I want to take care of you, don’t you?

JC: I do know that, but you can have some cute little chick that you could be running around with, 10 years younger and —

BC: I know I have my princess right now.

JC: Oh, you’re wonderful.

BC: How would you say the diagnosis of your Alzheimer’s has affected us and our life?

JC: Outside of all the feelings I have stored up, we still do the same things we did before.

BC: Mmm hmmm.

JC: And we still can go to dances and we can do things. But I don’t want to be an ugly lady that’s not in her head.

BC: You’ll never be an ugly lady, sweetie.

JC: (Sniffs.)

BC: Uh uh.

JC: I just somehow didn’t think that this was going to be my way out. And I still hope that it’s not gonna to be.

If there’s someone in your life who has memory loss and you really want to record their memories before it’s too late, you can go to our website, where you can download our ”Memory Loss Interview Tool Kit” that contains all the best practices that we’ve developed over the years for doing these types of interviews. You can also record them on the StoryCorps app.

That’s all for this episode. The stories in this episode were produced by Liyna Anwar, Yasmina Guerda, Katie Simon and me.

The podcast is produced by Elisheba Ittoop and me.

If you like the music in this episode, we have links to the songs on our website, and we do that for every episode.

Don’t forget to rate and review us on iTunes or wherever you get your podcast.

And you can call us tell us what you think or leave a message for someone you hear on the show. The number is 301-744-T-A-L-K.

Until next time, I’m Michael Garofalo for the StoryCorps podcast. Thanks for listening.